When I began to collect walkie-talkies, I thought they were all wireless transceivers with telescoping antennas. While it’s true that those are the only ones with which you can really walkie while you talkie, I soon learned that there were other things out there called walkie talkies— wonderful “string-phones” and wired telephone-type toys. Both proved to be just too much fun to ignore. This book covers them all, including the transceivers.

Those early string-phones are basically commercial versions of the old “tin-can telephone.” They, and the wired toys, often came in amazing kid-magnet boxes that were disingenuous about what was really inside, playing on everyone’s natural assumption that a walkie-talkie was a wireless thing.

As toys for kids, walkie-talkies have a fatal flaw. It takes two to play with walkie-talkies and it’s not always easy to find another kid who wants to play with the same toy at the same time. As any parent can tell you, kids are only interested in the same toy at the same time if there is only one of them.